The patient safety report focuses on systematic changes in health care rather than individual practices. The recommendations include specific protocols to ensure adequate nurse staffing, an increase in critical care specialists for intensive care units and plans to make pharmacists more active in patient care. The report also suggests that patients should be informed of their chances for better outcomes if they have elective, high-risk surgery at facilities with proven track records for the procedures.

The report was funded in part by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and based on work done at AHRQ’s Evidence-based Practice Center at Stanford University and the University of California at San Francisco. The 30 standards were culled from a list of 220 candidate practices. The report also identified 27 promising safety practices for which the scientific evidence base is incomplete.

“If health care leaders work to implement this important set of voluntary consensus standards, it will go a long way toward preventing medical errors and improving patient safety,” said AHRQ Director Carolyn M. Clancy, M.D.

A copy of the report will be released shortly on the NQF Web site at here.